there would be no going back for the queen. She would move heaven and earth to destroy Annwyl and he would do the same to protect her. But at the sound of his voice, she stopped. Cold. He wasn’t sure she had that kind of self- control. But, as always, Annwyl continued to amaze him.
“You son of a bitch!” Fearghus’s rage shook the walls of his lair, and he itched to beat the old bastard to death.
His father had his claw over his slashed snout while desperately trying to get his tail released from the blade that held it. “Did you see what that mad bitch did to me?”
“I should have let her kill you.”
“I gave you strict orders. . . .”
“I don’t answer to you! Get out.
“What is your attachment to this human?” His father’s shrewd eyes stared closely at his son, his nostrils twitched. “I smell her all over you.”
“I said go!”
His father looked around him to see Annwyl. “What did he tell you, little human, to get you to spread your legs?”
Fearghus released a fireball that sent his father flying across the cave, part of his tail torn off where the blade impaled it.
“Fearghus, no!” Morfyd shouted behind him. But he only glanced at his sister. His anger had a stranglehold on him now. Too blind with rage to acknowledge anything. Until he heard Annwyl.
“Fearghus?” She didn’t shout. She didn’t scream. She said it so quietly the rest of his family probably never heard her. But he did.
Annwyl sheathed her sword and listened to the fight between father and son. It almost reminded her of Lorcan and their father, but she doubted the fight would end with Fearghus crying and cowering in a corner.
The old dragon’s cold eyes turned to her. She pulled away from Morfyd, ready to face the old bastard when something caught her eye. The bright red of a surcoat. Shredded and sitting at the entrance to the chamber. She walked over to it as the family squabble continued. She crouched down beside the garment and also found chainmail leggings, chainmail shirt, and leather boots. All shredded and ripped apart. For a moment she worried that maybe her knight had become food for the old dragon, but she could find no blood and the garments seemed split apart.
She looked up at Fearghus who had just blasted his father across the room. What did the old bastard say to her?
Annwyl stared. How had she never noticed it before? That black hair that she loved so much on both her knight and her dragon. The hair she insisted on running her hands through when she talked with her dragon or gripping in passion when she rode her knight.
“Fearghus?”
He moved to descend on his fallen father, but her voice stopped him. He looked at her. Their eyes locked. And Annwyl felt a wave of cold spike down her spine. Her gaze shifted to Morfyd, but the woman looked away from her. Gwenvael, although still a little green, turned his entire body away. His eyes downcast. Then she realized that there was another. She looked up to find a silver-haired naked man staring at her. He grinned in greeting. Then he winked.
Annwyl stood and walked to Fearghus. She stood in front of him. “Fearghus?”
“I can explain everything. . . .”
“Can you, boy?” Fearghus closed his eyes at the sound of his father’s voice. The old dragon had hauled his enormous bulk up and stood behind his son.
Annwyl felt it at that moment. She had kept it at bay so long she forgot how good it felt to wrap it around herself like a warm cloak in the middle of winter. She unsheathed her sword as her rage spread through her limbs.
Fearghus’s eyes snapped open in surprise at the sound.
“Annwyl.” She moved around him, her eyes locked with his.
He turned his body as she walked. He waited for it. Waited for the blow. And he’d take it too. She was sure of that.
“Are you going to let some human do this to you, Fearghus?” His father barked in disgust. Annwyl now stood between the two dragons. Her eyes still locked with Fearghus’s, her blade pointing tip down, the handle gripped by both her hands. She held the weapon so tightly that her tan knuckles now white with the effort.
“You lied to me.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“I didn’t think you’d understand.”
“Just kill her, Fearghus. Kill her and be done with it,” his father sighed heavily.
“Tell me, Fearghus.” She raised the sword high, her rage singing through her veins. “Do you understand this?”
She spun on her heel away from Fearghus and, using all the rage she contained, slammed the blade into the old dragon’s claw between his talons where the scales were at their thinnest, nailing it—and him—to the hard ground.
The dragon’s head fell back and the roar he let out most likely rang out hundreds of leagues away.
Annwyl turned to her lover. “Burn in hell, Fearghus.”
She walked away, leaving the dragons to tend their wounded father.
Chapter 14
His siblings stood there silent, stunned by their father’s scream of pain. But Fearghus watched Annwyl. He watched her walk toward the exit. Watched her notice Briec staring at her. She stopped and stared back at his silver-haired brother. When he smiled at her, she backhanded him across the head, knocking the dragon’s human form into Gwenvael.
He glanced at his younger brother. “Go with her.”
“
Fearghus growled low, making sure his fangs showed. Gwenvael winced back and grudgingly followed.
“Keep her safe,” he called after his brother. He looked at Morfyd who finally snapped out of her surprise and now tended their father.
“How bad is it?”
Morfyd looked at her brother with wide eyes. “She went straight through to the cave floor. I think it’s stone.” She didn’t bother hiding the awe in her voice.
“No. There’s some dirt there.”
“Well, it’s going to have to be pried out. It’s imbedded.”
He sneered at his father. “He’ll live. I’m going after her.”
“What?” His sister stood up in front of her brother. “Fearghus, don’t. She’s angry.
“I lied to her, Morfyd. She has every right to be angry. Besides, it wasn’t me she hurt.”
“No. You’re not going anywhere until you help me with him.” She went back to Bercelak. “I can’t do this alone.”
